


The Convergent Darkness

by avulle



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Gen, Red Lotus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 17:23:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4271619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avulle/pseuds/avulle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the day of the Harmonic Convergence, in the 18th year of the age of Chun Tai, the avatar dies.<br/>On the day of the Harmonic Convergence, in the 18th year of the age of Chun Tai, the avatar is not born again.<br/>(Vaatu is released upon the world once more.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Convergent Darkness

On the day of the Harmonic Convergence, in the 18th year of the age of Chun Tai, the avatar dies.

On the day of the Harmonic Convergence, in the 18th year of the age of Chun Tai, the avatar is not born again.

(Vaatu is released upon the world once more.)

 

Upon victory, Vaatu, the embodiment of chaos and hate, immediately consumes his mortal half, cannibalizing Unalaq’s soul and resigning it to that which is beyond oblivion.

His body folds back in on itself, folding down into a mortal shape, and down into a mortal size.

A being which bears Unalaq’s face but does not house his soul opens his eyes, and they burn with an infernal red light.

Vaatu throws his head back, and laughs.

(The world shakes in fear.)

 

Vaatu, having never had an earthly attachment, immediately takes to the skies, standing on nothing, and surveys his new domain.

It is massive, created by his own hand—

Created exclusively for him to destroy.

(The spirit portals lacerate themselves into all-consuming abysses, and dark spirits pour forth from the void.)

 

Vaatu, chaos incarnate, follows his instincts.

He reaches deep within the earth—to where it pushes back, and resists him—and then pushes some more.

The earth tolerates him, and it tolerates him—

Until it very suddenly doesn’t.

Earth, the world around, shatters and breaks, rejecting all that has been built upon it.

(Halfway across the world, a crag of rock drives itself through the floor of a wooden boat.)

(Halfway across the world, a platinum cell is torn open.)

(Halfway across the world, an aquifer explodes into an open volcano.)

(Halfway across the world, magma bubbles up into a frozen wasteland.)

It is Vaatu’s first mistake.

(It is not his last.)

 

He descends upon the ruins of Republic City, surrounded by all the powers of the elements, and the living scream at the sight of him.

They run and scramble away if they can, and drag themselves away on whatever they have if they can’t.

They fear him like they have never feared anything before, and it is like music to Vaatu’s ears.

He is surrounded by the fear and hatred of ten million people, and he is stronger than he has ever been.

(Only one person stands up to face him.)

(Her face is carved with grim determination, and he gains no strength from her.)

 

She attacks him with long, flexible lines of metal, and he cannot bend them, so they strike his skin.

He destabilizes the ground beneath her feet, but she is twice the earthbender that he is, and the earth beneath her soles remains true.

The earth he throws at her does not reach her, and she spins and ducks beneath his flames and his ice.

Her long lines of metal strike him again and again, lacerating the body that is his but is not his, and Vaatu learns of pain.

(He finds that it is not to his liking.)

 

All around them, people run and escape, and he does not stop them because he cannot.

She is close to him, and she has exchanged lines for blades, and they slice deeply into his skin, and makes his weak, human arms unresponsive.

The body he is not used to controlling grows weaker with every moment, and, for one moment, Vaatu feels his own emotion.

A blade finally pierces his heart, and his weak, human body finally gives out.

A yearning abyss claws at his soul, a darkness that is beyond comprehension reaching out for him—

And Vaatu finally loses his patience.

(Vaatu finally remembers who he is.)

 

He is Vaatu, the spirit of chaos and destruction, the spirit of hatred and fear.

He lived ten thousand lifetimes before the first lion turtles crawled their way out of the mud—

And he lived ten thousand more before humans followed in their footsteps.

This world is his world, and all five elements were forged by _his_ hand.

The moon shines bright above him, his blood burns white, and his heart beats around the cold metal buried within it.

(The abyss vanishes back into the nothingness that it is, once more.)

 

He opens his eyes, and he gazes upon the human that dares to defy him.

His creation, who dares to turn its hand against its master.

The hope that had lived on her face crumbles, and he finally feels her fear.

He does not call upon the elements, because he does not need to.

(He is more than strong enough on his own.)

(Halfway across the world, the earth’s most favored child screams in agony, and the earth tears itself apart in its grief.)

 

Vaatu rises above the ruined city of fear and hatred, and he calls upon his five children to reclaim what is theirs, once more.

Republic City vanishes beneath the waves.

(Little pinpoints of fear and hatred are eliminated by the million.)

 

Vaatu leaves, having already lost interest in a land that now devoid of fear, and devoid of hatred.

(Five minutes after he has left, the earth’s most favored child crashes into the city like a force of nature, and Republic City raises itself from the waves, once more.)

(Fear and hatred that had dissolved into hopelessness dissolve into hope, once more.)

(Vaatu does not notice because Vaatu isn’t looking.)

It is Vaatu’s second mistake.

(Five million people rise from the waves, born anew.)

 

Vaatu walks the earth, and in his wake, spirits summon themselves from the earth, and poison all that they touch.

Fire races across the land, and the world is reborn anew behind him.

(Libraries burn by the hundreds, and a pacifist finally sees the virtues of war.)

 

When he reaches a city built entirely of metal, Vaatu is attacked once more.

Their lines of metal lacerate his skin, and their disks of metal break his bones, and their blades of metal slices deeply into him.

They are all pure, and without fear.

(They are not pure, and their hatred for him runs deep.)

 

Their metal refuses to obey his call, but the sun is high in the sky above him, and it melts just fine.

When he is finished, there is only one left, her hair tumbling over her shoulders, and her eyes burning with hatred.

She cannot lift arms, and has collapsed onto her knees—

But within her, there is no fear to be found.

(Behind her, the city that was filled with fear and hate is empty.)

 

Vaatu blinks, and she is gone.

(He felt nothing.)

(Vaatu feels the inklings of fear, once more.)

 

Beneath his footsteps spread the vines of the spirit world, flourishing, and consuming all of the city of metal in the blink of an eye.

(The hard metal crumbles beneath thick cords of hatred, and Vaatu finds yet another way of dealing with the impurity humans have forced upon his greatest creation.)

 

Vaatu walks the earth again, finding his way to the oldest wilds—

The wilds old enough for him to remember.

The wilds old enough to remember him.

(The wilds old enough to hate him.)

(The wilds old enough to be capable of hating him.)

The wilds do not bow beneath his will, refusing to allow themselves to be tainted—

And when he attacks the humans that hide within its branches, it tucks them away, concealing them completely from his vision.

Vaatu is enraged, and tears it to pieces.

He reaches deep into its wood, and he rips and he tears its heart out with his own two hands.

(All around him, blue fire burns, the swamp water rages, the wind whips—and the earth thunders.)

 

Within his hands, the pulsing heart of the oldest wild turns to plain wood—

(Deep beneath him, the heart of the oldest wild vanishes beyond his reach.)

Vaatu roars in anger.

(The earth does not allow him to follow.)

The earth shakes.

(Halfway across the world, his spirits encounter a cottage that has not yet been disturbed.)

(Halfway across the world, his spirits take their first casualties.)

 

Vaatu reaches the sea, and crosses the ocean.

He reaches an empty town, and stares up at his sister’s visage for a long moment before allowing his spirit wilds to crawl up and around it, and shatter into splinters.

Her face falls beside him, so he takes it in his hand, and sets it aflame.

(When it burns, it burns sweet, and the taste of its smoke is delicious.)

 

He continues South, and in his wake, human history is erased, the world remade as it was always meant to be.

(Halfway across the world, his only survivor returns to the only home she has ever known—and finds it destroyed beyond recognition.)

(Her scream echoes harshly against the sky, her spirit digs deep into the earth—)

(That which had always been two as one, finally cracks under the pressure.)

(A new element is born.)

 

He arrives at the south pole, and finds altogether fewer bodies than he should.

There is blood in the streets, bodies unburied, strewn all about him--

But his body remembers this place—and it tells him that are not _nearly_ enough of them.

(His wilds grow out of the permafrost, and grind what is left of the ruins to pulp.)

(Halfway across the world, his spirits start to die by the thousands.)

(Vaatu doesn’t notice himself begin to grow weaker.)

(It is his third, and final mistake.)

 

Vaatu enters the spirit world.

It is dark and horrible, and exactly as it always should have been.

When he emerges on the North Pole, the sun is shining high in the sky above him—reflecting harshly off of the snow and setting the whole world alight.

When he calls upon the sun to lower itself in the sky, it does not obey his will.

(When he calls upon the winds to coat the earth in thick clouds, they do not heed his call.)

Vaatu is enraged.

(The streets of the North Pole are empty, and bloodless.)

(It is a simple manner to return them to the sea.)

 

Vaatu walks and walks and finds the world empty.

(He finds ruined villages differing degrees of bloodless, but they are never as bloody as they should be.)

He grows increasingly frustrated until he remember who, exactly he is.

(What, exactly, he is.)

He closes his eyes, and he listens for fear.

(Vaatu discovers Ba Sing Se.)

 

Vaatu rises himself into the air, and the wind tears itself apart in his wake.

(The wilds trace his path on the ground beneath him.)

Vaatu descends upon Ba Sing Se.

 

The city sings with the fear of millions.

(Metal curls around his waist, and he is thrown to the earth, a mile outside of the city.)

Vaatu’s broken body dutifully puts itself back together, and Vaatu finds himself surrounded by invisible men.

(Within them, he can feel no fear, and he can feel no hatred.)

 

He rises to his feet, and does his best to meet eyes he cannot quite see—

And lightning courses through his veins like water.

( _I’ve always wanted a matching set_.)

Vaatu screams in agony.

 

The sun is bright in the sky above him, and it offers him no sympathy.

(The moon however, dutifully keeps his body alive, and gives Vaatu strength.)

Vaatu turns to face his attacker.

(Hard golden eyes stare down at him from a thousand feet up.)

Vaatu calls the wind to strike her down, and a hurricane brews around them.

(The dragon at her feet twists and bends and slices through the winds.)

(Lightningbenders are strongest in the rain.)

 

An explosion crashes into him from the side, the earth turns to magma beneath his feet.

Ice slices deep into his skin, and the air around him doesn’t answer his call.

(Within his attackers there is no fear and no hatred.)

He dies a thousand deaths, and stands back up again.

(Still, none of them feel fear.)

Lightning courses through his veins, once more.

(None of their faces fall with hopelessness.)

 

They are strong.

The strongest humans he has ever encountered, moving together in perfect harmony—

(It doesn’t matter.)

(He is _Vaatu_.)

The earth shatters beneath their feet, and the wind around them whips itself into a icy firestorm.

(The hurricane rages on above them.)

They take a step back.

(A new player takes a step forward.)

(His senses are flooded with hatred, once more.)

 

He is suddenly surrounded by a potent mixture of fear and hate, and where there were five people there are suddenly many, many more than that.

(But the one before him burns bright, far above all the rest.)

He reaches deep into the earth, to swallow them in the earth’s rage—

But, for the first time, the earth does not heed his call, and does not swallow his enemies alive.

(To his left is the most favored child of the earth, her hands holding the earth still, with milky eyes hard, and heart filled with hatred.)

 

Cold metal curls around his arms, and buries itself into the earth on either side of him.

(The woman before him has both arms outstretched, and her every movements pulls his arms tighter.)

Vaatu roars and spits fire, but neither the metal nor the earth gives, and his flames split before the woman before him.

(Vaatu feels the cold touch of liquid metal against the back of his neck.)

(Something that does not belong seeps through his skin, and floods his veins.)

(A something that moon cannot purify away.)

 

Vaatu screams.

(Pure, unadulterated power floods his veins, and the earth holding his shackles in place shatters.)

(The earth’s most favored child collapses into a pool of her own blood.)

His power returned to him, Vaatu makes his displeasure known.

(Points of hatred vanish into the earth by the dozens.)

(The metal in his blood does not fade.)

 

He spins and stares into the green eyes of his poisoner, but the shackles around his arms tighten just enough—

And more poison forces itself into his skin.

(He screams in blue fire, and she does not even flinch as it dies before her face.)

(She takes a step forward, draws a blade from her sleeve, and drives it into his chest.)

( _You should have stayed dead._ )

(His heart beats weakly around the blade, and does not heal.)

 

He pulls, and the shackles around his arms finally break.

(Metal’s first child crumples behind him.)

Earth attacks him from below, air, water and fire attack him from all sides, and metal slices deeply into his skin, but Vaatu disregards it all.

(The earth shakes with his rage, fire leaps from his skin, and his wind lashes out at any foolish enough to come close.)

(His arms are numb, and he cannot lift them.)

His attacker stands her ground—arms raised and eyes filled with hatred—

He summons a spike of ice, and drives it forward.

(There is a rush of wind, and suddenly an invisible man stands before him, Vaatu’s poisoner nowhere to be found.)

 

_Let go your earthly tether_ , the invisible man coughs, drawing the icicle from his chest.

_Enter the void_ , he crashes into Vaatu’s chest.

_Empty_ , _and become wind_.

(The earth vanishes from beneath them.)

 

Vaatu’s heart beats weakly around its gaping wound.

His arms lie heavily at his sides, refusing to answer his calls.

Metal beats thicker than blood through his veins.

(The unknowable abyss returns—wrapping around his iron limbs and unbeating heart.)

 

_Die with me, Vaatu_ , the invisible man proclaims, and within him is not a single scrap of fear or hatred.

Vaatu screams in rage, and what elements remain within him explode off of him in a wave of hatred.

(The invisible tumbles away from him, body finally still.)

Within his chest, Vaatu’s heart finally stops, and the world goes black.

(The abyss retakes its own.)

 


End file.
